


Semper Fidelis

by Tigresse



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Fear of Discovery, Love Confessions, M/M, Original Character(s), Some Fluff, True Love, True Mates, sociopaths romancing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-16
Updated: 2017-08-16
Packaged: 2018-12-16 02:38:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11819496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tigresse/pseuds/Tigresse
Summary: Sherlock falls in love with his nemesis. But how long can he protect him!





	Semper Fidelis

Sherlock wakes up to find the other side of the bed empty. 

“James? James?” 

No replies, just the soft sounds of breeze ghosting past the open window and the distant chirping of birds. It’s a sunny day, golden sunshine casts slanting beams on the wooden floor of the bedroom and Sherlock glances fondly at them before sniffing in the ambient whiff of sex on the sheets. It reminds him of the stormy night before and the wild, passionate love that had lasted for hours. He can feel soreness in places he hadn’t previously been aware of and, as he rises and stands before the full-length mirror, staring at his nude form, he sees many streaks and stains and scratches on his pale flesh. Like the inscriptions on a temple wall, he muses, for he had been no less than worshipped by his lover James Moriarty. 

He finds James in the garden, standing under a poplar tree, staring into the distance. As always, he recognizes Sherlock’s footsteps and says, “Petrichor.” 

Sherlock stops right behind him, “Yeah, your favourite scent of nature.” 

“Along with lavender, woodfire and sea salt.” 

“Yes, those too.” 

“You left a huge mark on my neck.” 

Sherlock grabs James and spins him around, tipping his head back by gently cupping his chin. “Yeah,” he says, “Looks pretty on you.” 

“Pretty things age.” 

“So?” 

James’ smoky grey black eyes penetrate his head, his skull, right into his centre of thoughts, as if seeking answers directly from the deepest recesses of his brain. “So, you will change. Your feelings will change. Everyone changes. Everything changes with time and decay.” 

“Semper Fidelis Jim.” 

Jim frowns. 

“It means….” 

“I know what it means,” he snaps irritably, “What amuses me is you expect me to believe it. 

***

Sherlock remembers the day he had managed to take his then-nemesis Moriarty out on a date. It was Halloween, a cold and dark late Autumn night. Moriarty had always been a strange man, different from the ordinary, far apart from the common milieu, therefore their date had also been somewhat of an odd choice. But it was odd only by normal standards. 

Sherlock had long accepted that he too was weird in his own way. Naturally he hadn’t found the choice of venue or the selected time as odd. If anything, he had found it novel and extremely innovative. 

It was a mostly abandoned, allegedly haunted old country house in Cardiff. It’s Gothic structure and isolation was eerie enough and to add to the creepy atmosphere, there was a dead tree in the premises. The holes in the tree-trunk and the bald branches spread out in every direction gave the impression of a grinning skull with multiple octopus like tentacles, as if trying to pull everyone into its black orbit. But for Sherlock it had been the best date ever. They had feasted on lobsters and caviar, champagne and cheese, smoked cigars and lain side by side on a thick blanket and stared at the skies above through the huge gaping hole in the ceiling of the room. 

That was the night he had learned that James Moriarty was as much of a storyteller and philosopher as he was a mathematician and astrophysicist. He had spoken as volubly about constellations as he had spoken of ‘designs’ and ‘pictures’ he could see in those stars. 

“That cluster there,” Jim had pointed out, “It’s like a little girl with a basket of flowers slung on her little arm, skipping past a bush.” 

“That one over there,” he had clutched at Sherlock’s arm in excitement, “Two knights engaged in a fierce duel. Jousting I think.” 

If Sherlock had found respect for Moriarty’s intelligence earlier, that night he had developed a fascination for the man. In a singular crooked and macabre moment he had even wondered how it might feel to crack open that head and see what swam beneath the surface of all those threats, theatrics and thoughts. He had reached out and threaded his fingers through Moriarty’s and asked him questions. 

Moriarty had not taken his hand back. He had patiently answered those questions. If his voice was any indication, he had been rather pleased that Sherlock had taken any interest in the curious habits he possessed. 

“Do you believe in ghosts?” 

“Can’t believe what I can’t see,” Sherlock had answered. 

“You can’t see air, so you don’t believe in it either?” 

“I can feel air. Can’t feel ghosts, sorry.” 

They had slept there from dawn to mid-morning and when the direct rays of sunlight had woken Sherlock up, he was pleased to see his date still next to him, blinking hard to get rid of the grogginess. The first words Moriarty had said that morning was, “Call me Jim.” 

***

Sherlock sits in his living room at 221B Baker Street, staring into space and filtering out the ‘noise’ of Mycroft and John talking to him. They had been at it for an hour now but Sherlock had put his walls up after the first five minutes. He knows what they want. They want him to revert to his old life as a cold, heartless, emotionless consulting detective who solves cases as easily as one puts on their PJ’s, occasionally spews out insults at the flunkies in Scotland Yard and performs experiments involving various parts of human anatomy. They don’t like him this way, brooding, thinking, disappearing for long periods of time, reading book after book and then texting for hours and smiling at his phone. 

“Dear brother,” Mycroft shakes him roughly, “You can’t be permitted to destroy your life. You have to pull it all together, for law, for society, for England….” 

As a child, Sherlock had been asked to forget ‘Redbeard’ for the sake of his grief-stricken mother. As a teen, he had been asked to stop rock climbing for the sake of his nervous father. As a youth and a young lad in his early twenties, he had been asked to stay in college and get his degree for the sake of his family and in his late twenties, he had been asked to give up cocaine for the sake of sanity, for John and of course to preserve his own career as a detective. Now he was being asked to do something for the society and nation. Where did he stand amidst all this? 

“How about letting Sherlock do something for Sherlock?” He asks, unable to keep the spite away from his voice. 

John kneels next to his chair, “Sherlock, he will destroy you. It is Moriarty we are talking about.” 

“I don’t know Moriarty. I know Jim.” 

“They are not different men.” 

“Oh but they are. Though, I don’t expect you to understand the difference.” 

“Then help me understand.” 

“Not until you have an open mind. You still think about the semtex vest.” 

“Kind of hard not to….he nearly killed me.” 

“Mycroft nearly killed him.” 

John startles and stands up, a defeated look on his face. Sherlock shows no remorse for the statement he has just made. 

Mycroft objects instantly. 

“That is not true,” he speaks in his cold, unflappable tone but his twitching fingers paint a different picture, “I had no intentions of taking his life or liberty from him. He was in no mortal danger or under any form of physical threat in my custody, he was allowed to sleep four hours a day and eat two frugal meals and drink three glasses of water. We detained him for six weeks but that was purely because he refused to cooperate with us. If he hadn’t answered our questions and pleas with just icy silence, he might have been out and back home in one third of that time. Sherlock, he is a menace to people, he has severe impulse control problems.” 

“You are making a big mistake Mycroft,” Sherlock looks at him disdainfully, “You are mishandling a real genius.” 

“Let me be the judge of that.” 

“Then let me be the judge of my own actions.” 

***

Jim’s eyes are alight with something else that afternoon as he rides Sherlock with wild abundance. His usually immaculately coiffed hair is all askew, giving him the true appearance of an attractive but unhinged mastermind, dark wisps falling here and there, face flushed with arousal and kiss swollen lips parted as puffs of air emerge from it at a steady pace. 

He looks delightful, mesmerizing. Sherlock knows that even during their passionate couplings Jim is never devoid of thoughts and plans. Right now he could be going through a new mathematical problem he has discovered, naming a newfound star, planning an assassination in South Africa or putting together the perfect bomb from waste products and toxic fish glands. 

He convinces himself that his obsession towards Jim isn’t really love but a great affinity for his magnetic, well-irrigated brain and the alluring, unusual personality the man displays. There is also a natural attraction towards someone who is so much like yourself. It’s like finding a soul twin. As a child Sherlock was branded a freak and a loner, someone disliked purely because he was ahead of his times and a towering genius who dwarfed his peers in more ways than one. He can see similar images in Jim’s past and a sense of righteousness makes him vow to protect this man. He doesn’t care if Jim truly needs protection, he would offer it all the same. 

“Sh-eerr….loccck!”

Jim’s screech of ecstasy brings him back to the present and he sees ropes of pearly white semen land on him in hot splatters as Jim bounces atop him in rapturous, bucking motions. He feels delightful tightness around his member and lets go with a groan, chanting Jim’s name in the aftermath as the smaller man collapses on him.

“Don’t look at me as if you love me Sherlock,” Jim warns. 

Sherlock stiffens. After two years together he still hasn’t figured Jim out quite yet but he’s getting there. He had discovered long ago that Jim hates stagnation, predictability, repetition. He can’t stand those things, not even on himself. He is a changeling, a force of nature that wants to absorb the colours and flavours of all seasons. There are times when Jim is needy, there are time when he is distant, there are times when he displays pure apathy and there are times when he literally ‘brain fucks’ Sherlock with his wittiness. The changes keep Sherlock interested in and captivated by this man and he quickly starts unravelling the mystery behind this sudden, unsolicited statement. 

“Then don’t look at me as if you don’t love me James,” he answers as soon as he manages to see a ray of light in the woolly darkness his lover had tossed at him. 

At first it seems as if Jim was going to strike him across the face. 

The raised hand falls to his side. 

Jim’s voice is broken when he answers, “Mycroft won’t get to me through you.” 

***

Two years pass but to Sherlock it seems that some things just don’t move past a point of prejudice. 

“He has stopped all his criminal activities,” Sherlock is not above begging at this point, “I travelled the world with him. He personally helped me dismantle his web. He put down a few people along with me.” 

“And how?” Mycroft hisses, looking uncharacteristically agitated, “He smashed a person’s face beyond recognition, blew up one of his aides along with his entire family in a yacht, put a traitor’s head on a spike and hung one woman to dry on a clothes line after bathing her in acid. He is wrong in the head Sherlock, he is all kinds of wrong. Just as a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet, a poison in any form or shape can only kill. We need to put him down. We have to put him down.” 

“Violent people meet violent deaths,” Sherlock argues, “And those cases you stated were all exaggerated. I couldn’t have done this without him and even you know that. You are putting his redeeming qualities in moderation and his issues in gross exaggeration. Both are lies.”

“God, he is getting into your head.” 

“I won’t let you put him down, no more than you would let me be happy with him.” 

“Then let’s incarcerate him, institutionalize him. At least he will be safe there, the world shall be safe from him and you don’t have to give him up completely. You can go and visit him once in three months or so. I can also….um….arrange for some private time for the two of you….if you wish.” 

***

Sherlock reaches the little café where he had asked James to meet him and is greeted by the sight of a terrified man, possibly the café owner, being threatened by a livid and almost manic Jim. Those dark eyes have an eerie light in them, as if they are reflecting sparks of a fire within, a fire that could destroy everything in its path and leave a trail of ashes in its wake. He grabs Jim and calms him down, then drags him into the rented car and drives off. Jim cools down suddenly and mumbles, “I shouldn’t have done that. I carved our names into one of their wooden tables….with a steak knife.” 

For some reason, Sherlock laughs. “So was that all the commotion was all about! That’s what we did as kids. On benches and doors and banisters.” 

“I missed you,” Jim leans into his embrace as Sherlock wraps an arm around him, “You were almost an hour late so I did that to pass the time. I-I went a bit overboard I…think.” His voice is suddenly small and Sherlock realizes this man does have a conscience in there, buried and small maybe, but it’s there. Given enough time, Jim can be made to see reason and repent over his actions. Sherlock has begun to understand the man in more ways than one and the thrill of solving the mystery, the enigma that was Moriarty, causes endorphins to run through his system. 

He squeezes Jim’s hand, “Can you pack in two hours?” 

“I can pack in one.” 

“Good. Because we are leaving for Ireland.” 

Jim does not even ask why. He has stopped questioning Sherlock and his decisions. It makes Sherlock feel an additional load of responsibility on his shoulders. He can’t let Jim down, not when he is trusted to this extent. 

“Semper Fidelis,” he says. 

“Amare et sapere vix deo conceditur,” Jim answers. 

Sherlock smiles. He has forgotten that for everything he can do, like speaking in Latin, Jim can match it equally or even better it on a given day. “Yeah,” he nods, “Difficult to love and be wise at the same time. I might not always be wise but I shall always be faithful to you.” 

“I like Latin,” Jim says and stares out of the window. 

***

Their first hideout is in Ireland, a place near Tipperary. Sherlock and Jim have taken out enough cash to survive decades on a modest budget and at least several years on a lavish budget. Not that they need luxuries. Luxuries are always pegged on a scale of comparison, depending on what’s most coveted. In England, residing in his townhouse on Conduit Street, Jim favoured Westwood suits. But now he couldn’t care less what he wore. Not when the greatest luxury is freedom. 

Their first months are happy there and Jim seems like a little child, filled with curiosity, nervous energy, a thirst to explore the unknown, a content feeling of being with Sherlock without having to watch over his shoulder all the time. 

For Sherlock it seems like a slice of personal paradise. He spends his mornings amidst nature, exercising his body and filling his lungs with fresh air. Noon is spent arguing several matters with Jim while cooking a one dish meal for the two of them. Arguments, debates and discussions range from quantum physics to molecular biology to international politics to the latest Manchester United game where they rip to pieces the strategy applied by the coach. Afternoons and evenings are spent with music and books. Sometimes Sherlock plays the violin, sometimes the flute, which he has recently learned. Jim plays the piano with him, easily inserting notes commensurate with the dark undertones in Sherlock’s compositions. 

They make love at night and fall asleep, but whenever Sherlock wakes up he feels a small hand and thin fingers clutching at his sleep shirt, his arm or his pajamas. 

For the first time he senses fear in the indomitable Jim. It scares him too. 

One afternoon Jim abruptly stops playing the piano and says, “I won’t be caged, ever.” 

“You won’t be. I assure you.” 

“I have lived thirty-six years on this planet. Long enough to not believe in fairy tales Sherlock.”

“I have spent thirty-seven years walking the same earth. I make my own reality Jimmy.”

They call it a truce then but the fear and scare linger on. They live by the day and love by the night and Jim often says ‘Carpe Diem’ nowadays. Sherlock finds it ominous and avoids adding to it.

It is all right for almost six months till a day arrives when it is not. 

Jim is sound asleep in bed in the early hours of the morning when he is practically lifted off it and put on his feet by an agitated, nerve-wrecked, shaking Sherlock. “I saw Mycroft and his men,” he hisses, “We need to leave, now.” 

They are gone just half hour before the cottage is surrounded and stormed by the MI6 men. 

“See you soon Sherlock,” Mycroft says as he looks at the now deserted cottage, “Soon.”

***

On their flight to Germany, where they have targeted Heidelberg as their next hideout, Jim is suddenly seized with the theory that John betrayed them. Sherlock had called John to wish him on his birthday and the former criminal is certain that the God-fearing, simpering John would have given the information to Mycroft that they were hiding in Tipperary. Sherlock tries to allay his fears saying he called John from Dublin, from a blocked number, and the call was too short for anyone to trace it to its source but Jim is a bundle of anger and jealousy and snarls and yells and snipes at his companion. 

Suddenly he stops and looks around. All their fellow passengers are staring at them. 

He looks rather wrecked and destroyed by his own foolishness and sinks deeper into his seat, looking small and vulnerable as he curls up. Sherlock overcomes his initial embarrassment and wraps Jim up in his arms, resting his chin on top of the man’s head. The woman seated on the aisle seat next to them shifts uncomfortably and walks away, asking the flight attendant for a change of seat. People keep staring at them as they walk down the aisle to go to the toilet while the flight attendants determinedly look away whenever they pass by. 

“They are acting so weird,” Jim says as the flight lands, finally. 

“If you talk so softly people will overhear hon,” Sherlock teases him. 

They are Michael Shultz and Lothar Weber now. New identities, new home, new life. 

The first weeks pass and Sherlock finds employment in a music school teaching violin to nine year olds. Jim finds employment as a French teacher at a local school. The earnings are not important, what’s important is that they lead a normal life. Or at least, pretend to lead a normal life. Getting up early, grabbing a quick breakfast and heading to work is normalcy at a very comforting level and they opt for that. 

One day Jim points out a little girl on the street. 

“I want her,” he says with a pout. 

Sherlock snickers, “Come on, she is not a doll.” 

“I know.” 

“Jimmy, really?” 

“What’s wrong in wanting a child?” 

The curly haired man kisses his neck gently and whispers, “Nothing wrong at all. Maybe one day it might happen.” 

The fears and worries multiply. If Jim is late by even five minutes Sherlock rushes out to check if he’s all right. Often he sees Jim coming down the path leading to their house and slows down deliberately, not willing to let his partner know he is scared too. 

Jim doesn’t speak of it often but he has begun to feel the pressures of leading a life on the run. Earlier he had nothing to worry about, nobody to worry for, but now he has Sherlock and he can no longer throw caution to the winds. The tight grip on Sherlock’s arm or clothing at night gets tighter and Jim starts sleeping literally on top of him, his heartbeat thrumming into Sherlock’s body, transporting that steady sound into his ears. That fear and clinginess spreads out into the other times of the day and Jim has those spells when he runs into a room, nearly collides with Sherlock and heaves out a sigh of relief. During those moments Sherlock can hear his heart beating again, this time it’s so loud he hears it from several feet away. 

One morning, four and half months since they had arrived there, as they are dressed for work and preparing a frugal breakfast together in the tiny kitchen, the house phone rings. 

Sherlock picks it up. 

“Hello Mr. Holmes….or should we say Michael Schultz.” 

The phone drops with a great clatter from his nerveless fingers and he yells in the general direction of this mate.

“Jim run!” 

***

Next stop, Peru. 

But they are discovered in a month. 

They are forced to spend the next seven months running across the world, from Uruguay to Alaska to Kenya to Lebanon. Between two to six weeks the dreaded call or letter drops in and they are called out by their original and new names. Each time they run they lose a bit of property and belongings, some money and a lot of nerves. Their finances have dwindled by half in just a year and half. Sherlock begins to suspect John as well and stops communicating with him when they make their next flight, this time to the mountain kingdom in the east, Bhutan. 

Four months pass and nothing untoward happens. The place is so peaceful, so friendly and so sublimely beautiful that it’s hard to imagine anything violent, any form of wrongdoing happening here. For the first time in many months, even Jim begins to look happy. 

***

“Ohhh Sherly!” 

“Jim O God….oh yeah!” 

Their moans and sharp intakes of breath mingle with the creaking bed and the steady thumping of the headboard against the wall. For weeks they had gone without sex or had ‘rushed half-sex’ as they called it, quick hand-jobs and humping or mutual masturbation, just to take the edge off their needs. But neither of them had been relaxed enough to make love the way they liked to. But that night had been special, Sherlock had cooked a nice meal for them and Jim had managed to get his hands on a bottle of fine wine. Candles had been lit and Bach’s music had filled the house like a warm, swathing blanket. It was their sixth anniversary. 

“Six years ago, in that haunted house of yours,” Sherlock teases, “To this pretty Bhutanese bungalow….”

“Shut up and give me a good, deep dicking,” Jim snaps but there is a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. 

Sherlock obliges and fucks him hard into the mattress. He hears Jim moan and scream and the happy, carefree early days of their affair comes back to him. He laughs and cries as he climaxes hard, filling his lover with his essence. 

Jim thumbs away his tears and growls, “Real men don’t cry.” 

Then he shoots all over Sherlock and moans softly, “I love you.” 

Sherlock’s breath hitches. Finally, finally. 

“I love you too Jimmy, more than you will ever know.” 

“Shut up, don’t get sentimental.” 

A few more months pass and the incidents of the past year seem like a bad dream that’s best forgotten. They find a cute little girl there too, about ten years old, with chubby red cheeks and dark sparkling eyes. She fetches them milk, newspaper, flowers. Sometimes she gives them little gifts like yak milk cheese made at home by her mother, a small toy llama made by her toymaker father. 

Jim gives her generous gifts and learns the local tongue from her. It helps him with his work at a nearby agricultural strip where he is a botanist and soil tester. It’s Sherlock’s turn to be teacher here as he takes up the position of a chemistry master at a boarding school nearby. 

One day an attractive Indian woman tourist asks Sherlock out, not realizing the man he’s having coffee with is his partner and not some fellow traveller or friend. As Sherlock politely turns her down, Jim just sits, watches and smirks. When she leaves, red faced and apologetic, Sherlock can’t help but feel a little let-down. “Not scared of losing me anymore is it?” He asks, “Jealous no longer?” 

“You are……Semper Fidelis,” Jim answers with a wink. 

Sherlock feels warm and fuzzy despite the biting cold of the winter that’s at the doorstep. Jim’s trust on him is the best gift the man’s given him and he grasps the brunette’s hand openly, kissing it. He’s normally not so demonstrative, not in this country or this part of the world, but this day is special. As they lay in bed that very night, snuggled together, they can hear and see the soft swirling snow come down in bunches. It’s a pretty sight and they stare at the glass panes of their bedroom windows for a long time. Sherlock can hear Jim’s heartbeat, he commits it to memory and closes his eyes, nearly nodding off in bliss when he hears Jim ask him something. Instantly awake he raises his head and says, “You said something Jimmy?” 

“It feels like confetti from Heaven.” 

“That’s a good way of putting it. Gives one vivid imagery to explore. I suddenly see this snowfall, differently.” 

“Man survives on imagery Sherly, some of them he calls memories, the others he calls dreams and ambitions.” 

“I agree. Just like I feel rain is tears from Heaven.” 

“Or snot.” 

“Ewwww.” 

“Sorry,” Jim laughs, not sounding sorry at all. 

“Hey listen Jim-Jim…” 

“Don’t call me that…..grrrrrr.” 

“Okay okay Jim-Jim, I won’t call you….ouuuuchhh…..okay-okkaayy really this time, I just wanted to ask….it’s your birthday next month baby, only twenty nine days to go. What should I gift a man who has had everything money can buy.” 

Jim wraps himself around Sherlock like a body suit. “Something original, something you can’t buy in a shop, something that….surprises me!” 

A challenge, woohoo, Sherlock smiles and rubs his hands in glee. He likes to be challenged, to be told to do something difficult, which would need a lot of thought and effort.

***

Two weeks later, Sherlock is proud of himself. He feels cocky and confident, not surprisingly since he had outdone himself this time. 

He looks up about forty feet from the ground and smiles. The outer structure is ready already. Now to start fleshing it out and putting some furniture inside it. 

He is building a tree house for James, with the help of little Dongzee’s father Drogbo and some of his friends. They have chosen the tallest and sturdiest cypress tree which is only ten metres from the edge of the cliff and about twenty metres from the edge of the bungalow where Sherlock and Jim live now. The tree house, consisting of a sitting room, a bedroom, a patio and a small galley with a pull-up ladder to reach it, could have taken months to build. But with reinforcements in the form of several local labourers offering their services and one of Sherlock’s contacts supplying him with instant and cheap building material, it could even be ready by Jim’s birthday. 

Dongzee helps him like a little conspirator. The men who are working on the tree house come in once James leaves for work and leave a few minutes before he returns about seven hours later. Dongzee begins to delay James every single day by dragging him to her home and treating him to hot cocoa, which the Irishman himself has taught her to make, and that gives the labourers and Sherlock an additional hour every day to get extra work done. 

The former detective plans to furnish the place sparsely. Just two chairs and a table on the patio and a hammock. A couch and a rocking chair in the sitting room, next to a coffee table. Fireless cooking arrangements in the kitchen with some portable battery and solar power operated kettles and a single burner stove. A counter and a couple of barstools to sit and have their meals should they sleep there on some nights. 

The only thing he doesn’t want to hold back on is the size of the bed in the bedroom and the thickness and comfort of the mattress on it. He finds himself harbouring naughty thoughts as he imagines a naked Jim on that bed, begging for it, screaming for it, climaxing wildly. 

One more week passes and one night, a particularly pleasant night, finds the two men seated on the doorstep to their house, a lantern hanging above their heads as they snuggle together in a thick yak-skin-and-fur blanket. 

“The snow looks so beautiful at night, with the moonlight shining on it,” Jim whispers. 

Sherlock presses his cheeks against Jim’s hairs, “Can I ask you something?” 

“Sure, go ahead.” 

“Do you ever regret giving up everything for me?” 

“Do you?” 

“I would….but only if you ever leave me Jimmy.” 

“I have no intention whatsoever.” 

Jim turns and looks at Sherlock, his eyes growing darker all of a sudden. The taller man hears that heartbeat again, his ears are now trained to pick up that rhythmic sound, and he doesn’t sense any quickening or irregularity. Jim seems calm as he answers, “I can’t deny there are moments when I am itching to plot an assassination, when I want to take a rude man down and butcher him, when I wonder what it might feel like to rob the richest bank in Singapore. But the next moment I try to finish my work quickly and return home on time because you would be here, waiting for me, pretending to do something which you are not. You have been hiding something from me in the past few days, haven’t you? What is exactly going on here Sherlock?” 

Sherlock shakes his head, “Just a few more days baby.” 

The darkness in those eyes melts, Jim looks like Jim again. “My birthday present…..” 

“Shush shush shush shush!” 

The Irishman giggles. He looks cute. Age suits him, Sherlock observes as he watches the fine lines around his eyes and the laugh lines around his mouth. He looks uninhibited, fresh, youthful, almost saucy. 

“Never told you how handsome you are,” Jim suddenly quips, as if he too was silently appraising his partner, “I have two great fears Sherly. One, I’d never get a chance to say what I have to say to the right person and two, I would be in some institution. That would be the ultimate indignity. I won’t accept it. I’d rather die than….” 

“Don’t say that,” Sherlock groans with frustration, “Not when it’s so close to your b’day.”

Jim grins, “I never thought I’d make it past thirty-five.” 

Sherlock kisses him and ruffles his hairs playfully, “Thirty-five is a thing of the past, a number gone by. You’ll be thirty-eight in a week. Someday you’d be seventy-eight and I bet that even then you’ll be a numpty little jealous nitwit who thinks I’m cheating on him somehow.”

“Semper Fidelis,” Jim yawns and relaxes.

“Semper Fidelis,” Sherlock hums. 

Things have been going too good and he almost feels like believing that the rest of their lives are finally about to happen. Baby steps, he decides, baby steps are what he would go by for now. No long-term planning, not when there is a Mycroft Holmes searching for them. 

Or is he? 

***

Two days later Sherlock wakes up to find Jim sitting up in bed, stretching his arms and rubbing his eyes. He reaches up and pulls him down on his chest, kissing him thoroughly. Jim wriggles and giggles, then pushes him off gently and gets out of bed. 

“Don’t go,” Sherlock whines. It’s his turn to feel clingy this morning. 

He has no idea why he feels this way. Maybe it’s the way his James looks, fresh and dewy and gorgeous, straight out of bed, with his bed hair and slightly puffy eyes. Maybe it’s because he remembers how it all began and where they had been some years ago, at each other’s throats and swearing to burn down each other. Something makes him feel grateful and afraid at the same time and a nervous ball of fear rumbles up his stomach. He clutches at it. Jim misreads the situation and laughs, “If you are planning to call in sick at work and make me do the same, then forget it. I am saving up my vacation days for a trip to Kerala in spring.” 

“One day won’t hurt.” 

“On your feet….actually no…..stay there while I get you breakfast in bed.” 

“Hmmm, that sounds delicious. Scotch eggs?” 

“For breakkie? No way. I can make your favourite quail egg scramble with bell peppers though. Interested?” 

“HUNGRRRY,” Sherlock winks and pulls him close again, “I love you Jimmy.” 

“Getting all randy in the morning,” Jim licks at his neck like a kitten, “But hey, we have to get to work.” 

Sherlock sighs and falls back on the mattress as James makes a quick trip to the washroom before padding to the kitchen, whistling happily and a spring in his step. The detective feels uneasy, something makes him wonder if he was just hallucinating all this happiness, this world they live in, if he would wake up suddenly and find it all gone. He curses his own weakness and blames it on the constant fear they have of being caught. 

“Sherly,” Jim calls out from the kitchen, “Dongzee is standing at the garden gate but not moving an inch. She looks a bit unwell.” 

“What?” Sherlock gets out of bed, “I’ll check.” 

“No hold on, I will.” 

“Jim no….” 

“Don’t be silly. It’s our own garden and front yard we are talking about. Maybe she spotted some stray dog or something. She doesn’t like dogs much.”

Sherlock sits on the edge of the bed as he hears the front door open. He hears Jim call out to the little girl. 

At first there is nothing to suggest even the remotest sign of trouble. The usual sounds come through to Sherlock, the distant screech of a bird, the wind howling around the landscape, the soft rustle of the leftover leaves on the trees around their house as a harsh winter slowly begins to rob them of all foliage, a bell tolling somewhere. Suddenly he hears a heavy thump and that propels him to tumble out of bed and rush to the front door. That sound was unusual, something must have happened, something was not right, something was going on outside or else James would have stepped back in with the little girl and whatever she had brought with herself. 

The first thing she sees is little Dongzee standing outside the gate still, crying. 

His fears are confirmed instantly. 

“JAMES….Jimmy?” 

Sherlock doesn’t even care that he is barefooted and steps out into the snow carpeted lawn, looking around wildly for his man. 

Jim is standing in one corner of the garden, next to the shed, eyes on something around the corner. “Jim what’s go…..” Sherlock shouts and rushes over to him but suddenly the few feet distance between them seems too great and several hands pull him back. He struggles, takes down one of them, punches the other, but there are at least six and he is easily restrained. He tries to free himself but it’s impossible to even move as he is dragged to the other side of the shed and the full picture is revealed to him.

“It’s over Sherly,” Jim’s flat, almost resigned tone makes him stop struggling. He realizes instantly as to why his man had said that. The whole place is teeming with Mycroft’s men, at least twenty of them and most of them armed, and Mycroft himself stands on top of the little hillock next to their property, gazing sharply back at Jim. Jim holds his gaze like an equal, not the least bit afraid. 

“Mycroft no, Jim come here,” Sherlock shouts. 

“It’s okay Sherlock, nobody will harm him, or you.” 

The familiar voice comes from behind him and he turns sharply at the man, “YOU!” 

John looks apologetic, “I always tried to call anonymously to warn you whenever I found out that your brother knew. But when you came here, you didn’t even give me your coordinates. I didn’t know how to…..” 

A pitiful groan emerges from Sherlock. O God how stupid he had been! Of course, it had been John warning him all those times. Mycroft or his aides wouldn’t call him and warn him in advance if they wanted to spring a surprise attack on him. How moronic he had been!

“James Moriarty,” Mycroft descends from the hillock like a king descending from his chariot, it would have seemed comical to Sherlock under better circumstances but right now he only feels dread as his brother approaches his precious James, “You will cooperate with us and not a scratch would be put on your skin. If you don’t cooperate, please remember we now know you have a weakness.” 

Jim looks at Sherlock. Initially that look reflects fear and angst but suddenly that changes and he appears serene, almost peaceful, as if he had made up his mind about something and nothing and nobody can change it. Had Sherlock not known him too well by now he would have simply considered that as one of the madman’s tricks, but a sense of doom prevails over him when he deduces his lover’s behaviour. Jim has given up but not given up, he knows it is over but has found out a way to end things in his own way…..oh no, oh no no no no no!

The next few things happen so quickly that even a genius like Sherlock has a hard time keeping up with it. 

Mycroft approaches Jim, three more men surround him, and then one of them take out a few items that are pertinent to those who are criminally insane. Body belt, straightjacket, even a mask. 

In a flash Jim disarms one of the men and grabs a revolver. 

“Myc let him go,” Sherlock feels dizzy and collapses on his knees. He feels John next to him but can’t hear what’s being said. 

“We don’t want it to end this way Moriarty,” Mycroft threatens. 

“It will end my way Holmes,” Jim’s grin is tinged by mania, his eyes are gleeful but dark, the unhinged Moriarty has replaced the comely, loving man that Sherlock had so grown used to. 

“James….” 

“To be incarcerated, kept there like an animal, my blood to be tested for research purposes, my toilet seat taken away if I as much as snarl at an attendant….” 

“No, you will be given your own suite, your privacy, you can even meet Sherlo….” 

“James Moriarty doesn’t need your petty favours. I will kill no one here but I sure as hell won’t let anyone take me to a madhouse either.” 

The revolver is raised to the temple. 

Mycroft steps forward, eyes wide and an arm raised. Sherlock extends an arm, as if trying to grab the hand that had once again turned towards self-destruction. Three men lunge at the small figure that lets out a sudden high pitched laughter. 

Sherlock hears two sounds. The deafening bang of a shot going off. Then a little girl screaming at the top of her voice. 

Sherlock feels nothing, senses nothing, remembers nothing after that. All he does is hear a stinging silence around him. He can no longer hear Jim’s heartbeat, that familiar lub-dub sound which quickened when they had sex or wrestled playfully and which was delightfully slow and soothing when Jim slept in his arms. No, he can’t hear it. He hears only silence. Strange things begin to happen to him, around him, and he can’t understand what and how. He hears footsteps but sees nobody, he hears the sound of voices but can’t make out the words, he tries to listen again but his memory plays tricks on him and he feels he should go back into the bungalow and wait for Jim to get up. 

Breakfast is getting cold.

They have to go to work.

It’s his turn today to make the bed. 

Jim likes apples. He needs to buy apples on his way back from work. 

But before all that….Jim has lost something. Something had come out of his head. It’s lying on the snow near his feet. And why is there so much red on the pristine white snow? Why is it spreading its ugly hue there, right there, in their garden? 

*** 

John watches, aghast, as Moriarty blows off half of his skull and slumps down on the snow like a rag doll that has been dropped. 

There is pin-drop silence for a few moments as everyone absorbs the shocking and unexpected incident. None had thought it would end this way, least of all Mycroft. For the first time in his life, the Iceman shakes like a twig in a storm, before he stumbles and lurches his way towards Moriarty’s body.

A ghastlier incident follows as a piece of bone shoots out of the former criminal’s head and lands somewhere on the snow with a sickening splat. Sherlock lets out an animal cry and crawls towards it on threes and fours, trying to collect the piece as if he wanted to put his lover back together again. The former detective mumbles incoherently and then crawls slowly over to the now still and lifeless body of Moriarty, touching the wound on one side of his head and then looking at the bone, almost looking like a child about to put a puzzle together. 

He tries to pull Sherlock back, tries to talk to him but his friend hears nothing. 

John watches in dismay as Sherlock tries to scrub the snow. His hands are doused in Moriarty’s blood. He looks like a man possessed. 

“He will be fine,” Mycroft’s voice rouses him from his state of panic and fear, “Once we take him back to London he will be fine. It’s just shock.” 

Later, as they prepare to leave, John walks around the place. He tries to familiarize himself with his best friend’s life in the last few months. The house is spacious but not too big, the furnishings adequate but not expensive, the garden neat but not too luxurious. He ghosts past the closet and sees how their clothes mingle together, peers into their bedroom and touches the sheets which are still warm and anointed with their mixed scents, he sees a half-made breakfast still on the stove. But nothing makes his heart ache than the sight of the half-finished tree house. The little girl who was beside herself with crying has been taken away and medicated. Her father still stands there and looks at the tree house and from his words in broken English John understands it was meant to be a birthday gift to Jim. 

Somehow the sight of that half-finished masterpiece, now awaiting an owner who would never come back to claim it, makes him break down into gut wrenching sobs. He cries and sniffles as he touches the ladder that was supposed to take Jim and Sherlock to their 'playhouse'. As he turns away, he hears the Bhutanese man take it down and break it into pieces. 

An unfinished story, an unrealized dream, this was all that was left of two lives. 

***

Months pass, seasons come and go but Sherlock remains the same. He was taken to the hospital first, then taken home, then committed to a psychiatry ward and finally taken to an institute that specializes in trauma and permanent mental disorders. 

He has been treated by the world’s best doctors and given the world’s best medications and facilities but none of them have made any headway into his case. He remains, essentially, an empty shell that nobody can penetrate, crack or even peer into. 

He is now in a private suite of rooms guarded by men Mycroft has personally appointed. There is a bedroom, a sitting room and a bathroom. Windows are all grilled up and too high for anyone to reach, all air conditioning vents sealed to ensure escape is impossible. Walls are padded to ensure no self-harm takes place. The rooms are monitored 24/7 to note down even the slightest change in the inmate’s behaviour and the best possible nourishment in the form of food, books, violin, drawing books and colours, even a laptop is provided. It’s ironic that the same set of rooms had been allocated for Moriarty earlier.

The violin has an inch of dust on it. The books are untouched. The laptop lies neglected in a corner. 

Now and then he cries a little, when the noise in his head and the memories become overbearing. But the moment the first sob tears out of him he quiets and curls up in bed. He remembers his Jimmy saying ‘real men don’t cry’. 

He draws, paints, scribbles and scratches designs and words on every possible surface. The wall, the floor, the door, the drawing book, the paper, the newspaper, even the sheets. Strange drawings of two figures in different situations, the real essence of which is known only to the man who drew them. 

John visits sometimes. Once Sherlock asks him if he can get the table, the table where his and Jim’s names were inscribed. But John can’t get anything further out of him. Where is this table? Who wrote it? 

So he gets him a table where he has inscribed the two names with the pointy tip of a screwdriver. Sherlock utters garbled words as he kicks the table but this time John understands why he’s rejected this gift. The genius is still trapped inside the man, the genius that instantly recognizes an unfamiliar handwriting, the inscription done with a screwdriver and not a steak knife, the ‘not so bold’ strokes of certain words. The good doctor leaves quietly, disappointed with himself that he couldn’t fulfil Sherlock’s last request to him. Somehow, he is sure the man will never ask him for anything again. 

And he doesn’t. 

His condition worsens with time and he becomes catatonic. 

A prematurely-aged, ashen faced Mycroft watches with eerie déjà vu feelings as Sherlock fills all the padded walls with a few words written in different colours of crayon. 

Jimmy-Jim-James-JimJim.

At the bottom of all the scribblings is a strange footnote, with a smiley drawn next to it. 

‘Semper Fidelis’.

**Author's Note:**

> Semper Fidelis a.k.a Always Faithful. While it's the motto of the US Marine Corps, it's the universal motto of lovers and soulmates. 
> 
> This story is not a tragedy in my opinion, but the triumph of love over coercion and conventions. At the end, you can take a lover away but the one who has truly loved will be 'Semper Fidelis'.


End file.
